Jalan: Mysteries of the Haunted World

The Spirit Layer

The Spirit Layer is an ethereal otherworld that exists as an unseen backdrop to the World and the cosmos at large. This Layer is used as a filter to magnify the magical impulses of living creatures – which normally have little force – to produce effects significantly more powerful than the energy poured into them. The Spirit Layer accomplishes this, scholars believe, but creating echoes in space and time which concentrate into a single point and moment, just as two mirrors facing one another can make a single object appear to be infinitely reproduced. This is also seen with normal events, which can linger in the layer as a weighty feeling, which some adepts can use to learn about past and, some say, future events. The effect is also believed to be to blame for the short-term nature of magic, since all potential force is compressed into a smaller span of time.

The Layer also appears to be the native land of spirits, and the vast majority of life here is of their kind. The Layer is not detectable by most creatures, nor are Layer-bound creatures normally aware of the World, but portals and “thin” areas between them are abundant, and some creatures can cross between them at will.
The Spirit Layer is typically divided into three parts, though the boundaries are constantly in flux and their parts are often discontinuous.

The Wild is the portion of the Layer that most resembles the World, and is composed of strange, serene vistas of barren land spotted with bizarre rock formations, plant-like spirit creatures, and the rare patch of invading vegetation from the World.

The Shadow Sea, which usually, but not always, lies downhill of the Wild, like a dusky black ocean of starless night. Contrary to its name, the Shadow Sea is a mixture of terrains, and its name comes from the eternal blanket of darkness that fills it. The land aches of decay, and its terrain features usually feel weathered, ancient, and forgotten, though there is very little to erode them in this dead, stale land.

The Starfield is a realm usually above the rest, which glows in perpetual twilight, with bright motes of light hovering always in the distance, and with rare islands of floating terrain creating small shadows in the sterile light.